Worse!

Just listen what shit I have to compose in order to earn my wife's household allowances:

"Der Euro am Abgrund" (2010)

http://www.videoportal.sf.tv/video?id=cd2a506a-6e39-4700-b98f-d4c894175d83

@dagmarpiano said:

I wonder why Hans Bleeding Zimmer looms so large in all these discussions. Maybe because he's had more success and influence than many think he deserves? And that makes him a prime example of everything you hate about the state of affairs?

I feel like I'm getting lumped in as a Zimmerian. I don't even particularly like his music. I mean, I thought he was effective in Inception for certain reasons to do with some of the chords and sound combinations, but it wasn't high art.  I mean, for example certain guitars sound great but it doesn't make them great artists.

For what it's worth, my favourite film scores are things like Morricone's Cinema Paradiso and a few John Williams films. And, James Horner's Krull which he did in his 20s was very good I thought.

Two reasons: a) He has gotten some pretty big blockbusters to score, and most importantly b) He has become the torchbearer for every inept charlatan who - until Hans' success - had no business thinking he could write for film. Now, and especially with all the execrable software of ready-made cliches lavishly prostituted (System Requirements: Half a Chromosome, Index Finger), one still cannot do Williams or Morricone, but one can do Zimmer!

P.S.: How you can love the soundtrack to Cinema Paradiso (simply the best there is) and get any sort of satisfaction from the Inception one is a total mystery to me, but each to their own of course.

@Errikos said:

P.S.: How you can love the soundtrack to Cinema Paradiso (simply the best there is) and get any sort of satisfaction from the Inception one is a total mystery to me, but each to their own of course.

I haven't seen the film Inception. But I am guessing that it's a provoking film and supports the score. Whereas, great scores support the film, thus making the film, which after all is the important bit, greater than the sum of it's parts; i.e. script, photography, editing, actors etc.

Jingly Jangly guitar music? Hahahahahaaahhahhahahahhahhahahahahahah

This whole thread went astray because the original question was too broad. Better or Worse? I mean come now! I guess I was trying to get to the core of that one and never did, but I'll just say it straight up, better or worse are relational terms so right off we need to know 'better or worse than what?' [I]

How does the author of the original post  want  'better than' defined-or could he at least give some clues-more than just 'older' film music? What qualities are you using? Just to reiterate my point that everyone missed that have been found to make music "Great"[ip]

1. Harmony descending cycle of fifths to tonic

2. Melodic appogiaturas

3. Melodic or hoarmonic sequence

4. Enharmonic change

5. Harmonic or melodic acceleration to cadence

6 Delay of final cadence

7. New or unprepared harmony

8. Sudden or dynamic or textural change

9. Repeated syncopation

10. prominent event earlier than prepared for

So if these are a few of the key features that make for good music, would the readers of this thread please identify which one of these (or carefully  reader defined qualities "long timpani rolls leading up to a crescendo and ending with a cymbal crash") features makes the music better than something else-again the comparison has to be spelled out.

So again the writer of the original post should have been asked to clarify what he meant before anyone responded as the reusluting responses have been little more than a dj's mash up. [H]

@Errikos said:

one still cannot do Williams or Morricone, but one can do Zimmer!

munch, crunch...

civilization3,

I assume you are enjoying your popcorn.

hey youse guys yelling at each other, why don't you just go over to my thread about my latest piece, "All Out Orchestral Assault"  and see how you like it.  It will soothe your jangled nerves.  

Rverne 10: I left the original question deliberately open, because I knew it would trigger tensions I've seen here before, and I was interested in the debate it might unleash. I'm not disappointed! Those with the biggest egos show themselves to be typically articulate, intelligent, insightful, passionate and yet necessarily blinkered, inasmuch as anyone with a strong position can only do so by blinkering out other positions.

Aesthetic value I think is a complex interaction of objective and subjective factors and therefore a lot of such debates are interesting but unresolvable. They do reveal the fault lines though, and we've had the full set here: objectivists, subjectivists, lists of objective features, criteria based on emotive strength, technical ability, privileged insight of the debater. We've had ad hominems and ad hocs from philanthropes and misanthropes, universalists and partisans. 

The usual baloney!

@Errikos said:

one still cannot do Williams or Morricone, but one can do Zimmer!

munch, crunch...

Hmm, better sense of humour than I expected from you, but the answer to your "question" is actually a resounding yes! Does the name Trevor mean anything to you?

Careful not to choke on that pop-corn now like you do in debates....

Erik - you're never going to get a proper discussion about films and film music because of individuals historical data and knowledge. Think about it this way.

Let's for one moment prentend I'm a total moron. [:O] Aged say up to and around 40. I started watching films at the cinema when I was a teengager and watched them again on TV. I don't watch old films because they're uncool and none of my moron friends are interested in them either.  We like to watch films that look like video games. Video games have loud music, lots of colour and effects and films should have loud music too otherwise what's the point. We like to use words like 'cool' and 'awesome' a lot and don't like to be made to think when waching 'movies'. We certainly would never dream of reading a book because none of our parents did either. Anything in black and white is strictly taboo.

If your'e in a position, either by design, or just sheer accident of age and have probably seen just about everything made from the 1920's onwards, you find yourself being in the unenviable position of being able to make comparisons.

PaulR - you're using the 'competent judge' defence, where you know better because of your training/age/experience. This can't prove anything, because sometimes old farts get stuck in their ways and can't appreciate something good because it's unfamiliar. Not always, sometimes like you say, they do know better, but this possibility invalidates the reliability of an appeal to greater knowledge through age.

I have a reverse theory, that in some ways younger people have greater insight, because they are making new connections in their brains. They don't have formulas so they have to use creativity to achieve good results. Most of the great poets wrote their best stuff before they were 40, for these reasons, and also because they experience emotions more strongly.

There is wisdom in age, and there are artistic possibilities revealed through newly learned techniques, so I'm not saying everyone starts good and gets worse. I'm saying that in art there are pros and cons of age and youth, and neither gives privileged access to an ultimate insight or wisdom.

There's no such thing as an old fart. You're either a fucking moron or you're not. It's not dependent on age. Most young people today.... (say this to yourself like the actor who played Patton).... Most young people today...... couldn't make new connections in their brains...... if you stuck 3 kees of tnt up their pipes.

Did you know that over 33% of children in the UK today don't own any books? And did you also know that their parents don't either? That's actually a fact; not just some made up bulls h i t.

And as for poets. There's a poet today that lives in and around the hellhole that you come from, who, at the age of 79 is disappointed not to be writing 6 poems a week. In his very young days he states he was lucky if he wrote 7 poems a year.

There's only one way to be any good at music or just about anything and that's constant study and practice. I am guilty of neither anymore preferring to play golf, go to auction houses and take photos. Occasionally when the music publisher rings me up I do some music. Mostly out of fear.

The only difference between being 60 and 16 is that when your'e 16 you can generally s h i t and  piss in a straight line.

Ok, I see it all now, you're right, and I thought this was a serious discussion.

sigh[:P]

Well, some of us tried but futilely, as Paul concluded, since some people don't really know much (to have references), and never discuss anything anyway; they just state their preferences and if you don't agree you're either too old (which I'm not), too blinkered (that was never even explained, unless not blinkered is someone that likes and finds quality in absolutely everything indiscriminately), or arrogant (well, at least superficially I'm prepared to concede that point).

Perhaps Dan - who is not really correct on the poets since a lot of the greats died too young for us to know how they would have written in middle/older age, but correct in pointing out that creativity on the whole does wane with age - should have created a thread exploring ice-cream preferences instead (or pop-corn). I think some of the contributors here would be much more suited to that kind of "discussion".

P.S.: Paul, I don't know where you got that statistic about the book-owning demographics in the U.K. but, if it's true, it is a highly disheartening and dangerous proposition.

@Errikos said:

P.S.: Paul, I don't know where you got that statistic about the book-owning demographics in the U.K. but, if it's true, it is a highly disheartening and dangerous proposition.

Erik - I always like it when people start talking about their favourite colour. Haw!Haw!

That statistic came from a professor being interviewed on BBC Radio 4 yesterday while I was French polishing a mahogany box. I would also add, that it's probably a conservative one. Things change. Most children read nonsense books like Harry Potter these days if they're going to read at all. It's the musical equivalent of listening to HZ all the time without ant further exploration. Education is a great motivator of imagination. For the past 13 years we've had an appalling public sector education system in this country which will hopefully change over the coming years.

This is, I'm afraid, partly a product of European Union rules and regulations. These rules are now being graphically highlighted after yesterdays events. The people of EU countries need to understand, and I'm sure they do, that the English have no issues with them at all. It's the political situation that's now become untenable. 

After all, take Angela Merkel (someone please). She's affectionately known in some circles here as Colonel Klebb. And when Sarkosy says the English live on an island - straight off the bat I thought - you don't get to be President of France for nothing do you?

I'm under the impression that this is just another thread that clandestinely has outlived its actual right to exist. We won't tolerate defamation here.

I saw Chinatown for the second time tonight after 18 or so years. I also looked at the special features (missing from the old VHS version) and guess what: As if it wasn't enough that the soundtrack was certainly not as "very emotional", "original", "melodious"(!!), or as "very expressive" as the copy-paste, index-finger masterworks copiously extolled in this thread, it took Goldsmith the better part of 9 days to compose, as opposed to the 9 hours it must have taken Hans to wrap the whole of Inception using Project Sam Essentials. How far have we come...

 Who said that? 

Chinatown is one of the greatest and most perfect films ever made and the apotheosis of film noir and Goldsmith's score is a piece of absolute inspiration from the first note to the last.  It is also total perfection.  No one could ever write a better piece of film music than this score, which represents this great composer at the absolute height of his powers.  The trumpet solo in this film is simply unmatched by any other.  It is haunting and accompanies the intense psychological aspects of the film in an almost uncanny way. 

Simply a masterpiece... But did you know Goldsmith scored it in 9 days??!! He came in as a last minute replacement; what a professional! And it's not just the evocative trumpet solo, but also some very interesting piano effects that blended beautifully with the chamber ensemble, and other remarkable aspects that make this a classic score. Nine entranced days that spawned a justified Oscar nomination, and a tune that will still be relished long after the "epic" dust has settled; long after the pattern-mongers have returned to the D.J. caverns, where they belong...

Chinatown has just about everything. One of the few films I've kept on DVD and haven't sold on Ebay. That film belongs to Faye Dunnaway and not so much Jack Nicholson, even though his performance was one of his best. You couldn't make a film like that today. Why? Because producers aren't completely stupid. They know that a film like Chinatown would be today, a top down rather than a bottom up film. What do I mean by that? Simple. It's about the level of intellect that you're having to SELL to. An audience today needs certain elements to make it go to a picture house - and Chinatown just doesn't have that - you're talking about commercial numbers on seats. It would be regarded as a pro bono art film - a bit like Glengarry Glenross was at the time it came out. No money in it. Actors go out on scale etc.

There have been attempts over recent years to make films in the Chinatown mold. One that springs to mind is LA Confidential. With  a JG score too. But even then, while it's a very well made film it fails to make it onto the Chinatown plateau simply because of the level it needs to appeal to. Therefore it's 'intellectual' starting point is a little way down the scale.